For Patrick Weil, browsing Zemmour for falsification of immigration history

In an article published On the American website “Public Books”historian Patrick Weil, who specializes in immigration, puts things right about “Great replacement”. If the topic is at the heart of nationalist Eric Zemmour’s campaign, and if it is brought up by far-right theorist Rino Camus, it does not come out of nowhere, he argues. In fact, it was boiled in much larger medium pots, notably “Le Débat” magazine.

The end of the ‘debate’: for Marcel Gaucher, ‘the ruling elites have become uneducated’

What’s called ‘Identity insecurity’which Zemmour brazenly exploits, is based on a “Hidden Narrative” Long before the political rise of the controversy. This current of thought is based, according to Patrick Weil, on a false narrative of French immigration policy. According to this story, which eventually fueled public opinion, former French President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing allowed immigrant family reunifications in 1975, causing a massive influx of families from North Africa and Africa. Even the very serious public radio France-Culture, at the time of the former president’s death, in December 2020, presented Giscard as “the father of the family reunion” – as if it was the most important decision. presidency. However, the truth is quite different, as the historian recalls: in 1975, a decree replaced only pre-existing administrative circulars, but without changing anything in substance: immigration under family reunification has been in France for decades. It was by no means Giscard ” the father “.

By a class of influential French thinkers, previously identified by Patrick Weil in his book “Le sens de la République” (Grasset 2016), this misinterpretation of Guiscardie’s policy It turned into a conspiracy theory in its own right.. quotes Article from the third quarter issue 1990 From “Le Débat” magazine featuring the demographic Jean-Claude Chesna “with an unrecognized, almost exclusive preferential policy in favor of Africa in the name of the exigencies of foreign policy, with which the institution is admirably aligned”. at Another article from the same edition of “The Debate”titled “The New Moral Order” by sociologist Paul Unite, attacks Prime Minister Michel Rocard and talks about “Cultural Transmission of French Identity” Based on “Identity Scales Offset” We’re not far from an idea “Great replacement” :

What is Michel Rocard’s government proposing? Teach them, from school, to know about these foreign cultures and ways of life. The moral order that the media continually restores to respect the right to be different aims to leave unformed a major long-term project of cultural relocation of French identity (…) Abolition or the Franc, according to the views – and the secular program, which was never abandoned, of Protestant revenge: to plunge Galician Catholicism into sectarian pluralism (the Protestant influence is great in the socialist government, Rocard, Jospin, etc.). »Matt Le Débat: What future for magazines?

“new interactions”

Another example, six years later, In a column published in “Le Monde”Sociologist and philosopher Bruno Latour reacts to Justice Minister Jacques Toubon’s project to ban Spreading racist and xenophobic messages. Latour criticizes a “new crime of opinion”, arguing that these questions should be the subject of political debate rather than an injunction. Hence the French refused to “The obligation that we want to impose on them is to take the foreigner’s acceptance of a certain truth, of a specific truth, of a natural truth, of an inescapable truth.”. According to Latour, anti-racists are “naturalization” Sweat, “Prove it, by making a law that we can no longer talk about it, that we can no longer freely decide who we want to be, how much, and what skin color.”

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Today, Fail confirms, to close the episode, Marcel Gauchette, former editor-in-chief of “The Debate”, Publicly welcomes Eric Zemmour’s candidacy Which had, as the latter says, an advantage To reveal the truth about the French situation that the other candidates have left aside or been mitigated. It particularly exposed the uncertainty about French identity.” Admittedly, Guchet said in the same interview with Europe 1 that he didn’t have a “Don’t compromise” towards Zammour, but his statements sparked controversy.

Patrick Weil is not only attacking these intellectuals who are sometimes described as “new reactions”. He also criticizes the left for having faced attacks against immigrants by disguising itself in a moral position, when it should also have fought such a ‘faking history’ French immigration policy. By failing to produce a compelling alternative narrative, he left room for the idea that the “Great Replacement” was being carried out with the complicity of the establishment. Did the French elite conspire to encourage immigration from the Maghreb and Africa? The answer is simple: no.The historian decides.

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Historical reminders

He points out that the Evian Accords, which recognized Algeria’s independence and were ratified by referendum, provided for the free movement of people between the two countries. Then the number of Algerian immigrants rose and the French government halted this flow, negotiating quotas (new agreements were signed in 1964 and 1968). At that time, on the other hand, France opened its borders to unlimited Portuguese immigration …

As for family reunification, its principle dates back to the end of the 19th century, Weil notes: immigrant workers from Belgium, Italy and Poland were accompanied by their families. The 1975 decree, which changed nothing in substance, did not lead to any increase in family reunification: indeed, immigration from the latter has since declined. “What was really criticized in the 1975 decree, consciously or unconsciously, was the application of the same rules to immigrants from Africa as to immigrants from Europe.”Judge Patrick Will, who asserted that, since 1978, Giscard had expelled a large number of North Africans, including 500,000 Algerians, who had often been on French soil for decades.

He notes that unlike immigrants in the early twentieth century, the arrivals in the second half of the twentieth century were mostly French citizens. However, this did not facilitate their integration, quite the contrary: “Although they were entirely French, they and their children were often discriminated against. Their French citizenship was not a foolproof protection from ambiguity, ignorance and racism..

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Since 1973, children of Muslim immigrants have had the opportunity to work in their mother tongue in public schools with teachers from Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia or Turkey. “This was decided in the name of cultural diversity, but also for another ironic purpose: so that these ‘immigrants’ could more easily return and settle with their parents in their country of origin.”

According to Patrick Weil, the priority should be to teach children the history of colonialism, decolonization, and immigration. It is part of the common history of the French people, in their diversity. The historian concludes that it is the best antidote to the poison of racism and discrimination.